Artificial intelligence (AI) is helping businesses adapt to the changing and uncertain global market, said Richard Fleming, head of advanced analytics for Asia-Pacific at Bain and Company, an American management consultancy, at the 2025 Summer Davos Forum which concluded on Thursday in north China's Tianjin Municipality.
Also known as the 16th Annual Meeting of the New Champions of the World Economic Forum, the 2025 Summer Davos Forum was held from Tuesday to Thursday under the theme "Entrepreneurship for a New Era", with a focus on how businesses can stay resilient and innovative in an increasingly complex environment.
In an interview with the China Global Television Network (CGTN) on the sidelines of the forum, Fleming said "I think the good news for businesses [is that] actually AI really helps to adapt to this changing world and to this uncertain world. If you think about it, across the sort of value chain of the business, from product development, supply chains, sales and marketing, providing service, right up at the front in product development, we've been working with clients actually to move away from the sort of traditional surveying of their customers, to use social media, for instance, and being able to mind that all the time and understand what their customers want in their products. That actually helps them, if they're global firms [to] be [more] global, but also [benefits them at the] local [level] and that creates more dynamism in the business."
Fleming also stressed the importance of innovation, especially in the financial sector.
"There's going to be the picks and shovels associated with supporting compliance and making sure that data is secure. That's really important. It's important for customers as well as for businesses. But, really, it's in the innovation, so the knowledge that you can actually capture to help provide wealth management services. Or the data that you can develop about businesses and consumers to allocate capital better and lending better. The information that you can give to consumers so that they can choose a better bank account, a better interest rate when they choose their bank. All of those things actually create huge amounts of innovation in financial markets, in financial products. So I think it's all going to be in innovation, really," he said.
The 2025 Summer Davos Forum attracted over 1,700 influential figures from more than 90 countries and regions to discuss how entrepreneurship and emerging technologies can unlock dynamic and resilient economies.
AI helps businesses adapt to changing, uncertain global market: analyst
